US recognition of a Palestinian state could change everything 

Imagine President Biden saying the following: “Today, the United States is joining 144 other countries in recognizing the State of Palestine.” After Spain, Norway, Ireland and Slovenia’s recent recognition of a Palestinian state, such an announcement is no longer so inconceivable.  

Thirty-three years ago, I negotiated an agreement between Mahmoud Abbas, the current president of the Palestinian Authority, then Yasir Arafat’s deputy living in exile in Tunis, with Yitzhak Rabin, then defense minister of Israel. Rabin agreed to appear together with Arafat on a special ABC News broadcast to be moderated by Peter Jennings. At the time, it was illegal for any Israeli to even speak with the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO). Rabin planned to use that exchange to break up the unity government he was in with Yitzhak Shamir and force new elections. He believed he could win by running on a platform calling for negotiations with the PLO.  

Sadly, the broadcast didn’t happen, for reasons too complicated to go into here. But it would have been an extraordinary act of disruptive leadership by Rabin that could have dramatically reshaped the conflict at that moment in history. 

If Rabin could break the taboo of recognizing the PLO, a terrorist organization dedicated to the destruction of the state of Israel, as a legitimate negotiating partner, why couldn’t Biden now break the taboo of America recognizing a Palestinian state? By unilaterally recognizing Palestine, President Biden could dramatically reshape the Arab-Israeli conflict. American recognition would make clear to Israel that the establishment of a Palestinian state as part of a “two-state solution” is the only realistic basis for an end to recurrent cycles of war. 

Mutual recognition has been the heart of the conflict between Israel and Palestine since Nov. 29, 1947, when the United Nations General Assembly passed Resolution 181 recommending the partition of the territory into two separate states, one Jewish and one Arab. Every American administration since has taken the position that it’s up to Israel and Palestine, by themselves, to negotiate a final settlement based on this formal partition. But when one of the parties explicitly rejects that process, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu recently did, there is no longer any logic to that argument.  

In such a situation, the world needs to step in and set new ground rules.  

The horror in Gaza is the result of this failure of mutual recognition, but its very grotesqueness presents the world with an opportunity — indeed, the necessity — to intervene. American recognition of Palestine would be a game changer that could jumpstart an historic deal between Israel and the entire Arab world that would transform the Middle East, a deal such as Secretary of State Antony Blinken has floated. It would entail a quid pro quo of recognition between Israel and Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states that would unlock the conflict from the deadlock that has stymied negotiators for nearly 80 years.  

Blinken’s plan is that a cease fire and return of hostages, followed by the promise of normalization with Saudi Arabia and the other Arab states that surround Israel, would be enough of an incentive that Israel couldn’t refuse. Phased in over several years, the agreement would allow enough time for a nascent Palestinian state to be established. If there were good will and trust between the parties, such an agreement might work. But the reality is that the current Israeli government is dominated by a messianic political faction whose foundational principle is that the Biblical lands of Judea belong to the Jewish people alone.  

America cannot dictate what Israel will do, but if the United States were to recognize a Palestinian state, it would be a political tsunami that would likely topple Netanyahu’s extremist government, as a majority of Israelis are clamoring for. A new government would invariably have little alternative but to negotiate a final status agreement within the framework of the Blinken-Saudi peace proposal. Without the bold move of American recognition of Palestine, the deal has much less of a chance of success.  

Israeli and Jewish voters here would initially call America’s unilateral recognition of Palestine a betrayal, but, ironically, it would give Israel the recognition and peaceful relations it craves from its Arab neighbors. With a likely cease fire, the return of hostages, and prospects of a regional rapprochement between Israel and Saudi Arabia, American Jewish voters are likely to credit Biden with bringing peace and security to Israel. It would immediately bring back into the Democratic Party fold the disenchanted young protesters and Black voters Biden needs. It would be the bold, decisive act that would secure President Biden’s place in history. 

David Hoffman is the author of “Citizens Rising: Independent Journalism and the Spread of Democracy.” He was involved in tracking two diplomatic initiatives prior to the Oslo Accords.